Baseball Cards

One of the great tragedies of my life (said with some tongue-in-cheek) was coming home for the first time from college and finding out my mom had thrown out my box of baseball cards. The box was huge, probably four foot squared and filled with all the cards that had been purchased with paper route money and allowances over the years. I can definitely remember having at least five Nolan Ryan/Jerry Koosman rookie cards. Woo boy, those were worth quite a bit during the golden years of collecting.

The post found here by Josh Wilker put me in this mind frame. I remember that card found on his post. The nostalgia from seeing that card was quite powerful. Of course, it was a Topps card and for me at least, that was the only brand that mattered. The others were pretenders, even if they later came out with shinier versions (which corrupted Topps when they had to keep up with those guys). Topps cards had the same feel as the old Sporting News. Recycled or unbleached paper and cardboard with a grainy feel. It was the stats on the back of the cards that I valued most.

For you youngsters, there was a time, not very long ago, when you couldn't get player statistics at the touch of a button or with a keyboard click. But a Topps baseball card had it all there at you finger tips. You could see a player's baseball life on that card.

Buying packs of baseball cards are a thing of the past. Some stores still sell them, but they are five dollars a pack. Heck, we could have gotten 50 packs for that amount of money. We flipped cards (a precursor to later gambling pursuits), clipped them on our bicycles to make a cool noise (another thing of the past as kinds now have ATVs which make real noise).

You had to buy at least two or three packs to make it worthwhile. The Topps logo was on the top of the paper wrapper (wasn't foil in those days). The wrapper sealed on the bottom and you simply pulled the pack open. I can't remember how many cards came in a pack...was it ten? fifteen? Anyway, it was always exciting to separate the cards from the wrapper, quickly throw the useless gum away and see who you got. The real dedicated ones like us used to also mark off those list cards where the players were listed along with the number of their card with a little checkbox to the left of each name. As we got a player for the first time, you took a pencil and darkened the box. It was cool to see which of us had most of the boxes darkened.

I seem to remember that Zoilo Versalles, the Cuban player who is most known for his years with the Washington Senators/Minnesota Twins, showed up in every pack. Some cards were like that. Yankee cards were always valued, but for some reason, you could never get the ones you wanted. Mickey Mantle almost never showed up (nor Willie Mays for that matter), but you were sure to get a Mike Kekich or Steve Hamilton card.

I ended up buying a Mickey Mantle card (#500 in the series) from his last year that had his entire career listed. I bought it on eBay for $250. That sure would have bought three years worth of cards when I was a kid.

The very best cards were from players who played a very long time. Pete Rose played for 60 years or something, and the back of his card would be in really small print. Those were cool. Al Kaline had a cool card as did Ron Santo and others who played a long time.

I'm not saying this isn't a wonderful time to be a Fan with all the stats, box scores and analysis you have at you fingertips. But it sure would be great if you could get a pack of Topps card for a few dimes on that old feel cardboard. Those were great days.